The unending winter
by CrossoverAUman
Summary: A frozen god with the powers of ice. A lonely, bullied pony. Discord and Celestia trying to make it work, and Luna wishing she could get herself some romance too. What does it spell? I'm not sure, I'm still figuring it out as I go.
1. Chapter 1

"He may have killed them, but the blood lies on your hooves, _'Tia_."

Or

Why Discord and Celestia stopped dating and started a war with each other.

OR!

In which the author ... _royally_ fucks with MLP: FiM, adds a character, states that there's like six or seven Derpy's, and generally seems pathetic.

* * *

Chapter 1: The rise of Winter Snow and his herald, Frozen Wastes.

_Somewhere above the bright clouds of bright and shining Equestria, where ponies of all kinds prance and play, there lives a dark figure. His fur is a light, whispering blue, like the space between two snow drifts on a sunny day. His large wings are coated in ice, and his horn seems to shine with frozen water. He is an alicorn, large and healthy and strong, even for his kind._

_He lives in the wildest of skies, where nopony dares fly, where clouds form and dissipate without direction, where the wind is so fierce it could tear the wings from a weaker sort of pony than he. Here in this realm, there is never rain, no matter the weather below- it snows here, an unending blizzard. This place where this pony makes his home is unyielding and fierce, and to survive there would be a miracle- but he, obviously, is thriving. The pony settles himself on a cloud, one that without him would have probably split itself apart years ago, forming smaller and smaller clouds, joining with others in what is, other than the pony, the only thing like life up here, though a pale reflection.  
_

_The pony looks down upon a small town and smiles, a strange mixture of a smirk and a frown. So many memories... His sisters, his brother, his mother and father... The summer palace was there once, with its rooms designed to dispel heat, where he could play with his family in the warm months and not fall ill no matter how hot it was outside. Watching his eldest sister practice controlling light, watching the next eldest of their group learn shadow magic- not dark, but certainly not the bright, hopeful force the eldest commanded. Learning to control his own feeble magics with his brother, experimenting with combining their powers... Becoming a strong stallion and chasing away any suitors his sisters might find with his brother._

_Then the dark times, when his parents died, the immortality sucked out of them by some horrible monster the four had accidentally summoned... The palace falling to the ground like so many children's toys, like little blocks of a tower knocked to the nursery floor. The fires that nearly killed him, too... The monster attacking them, and his brother going against it, fury in his yellow and red eyes. Seeing it fall, screeching for mercy as his brother tore it to pieces in his grief over the death of their parents._

_His eldest sister looking to his brother and telling him she could love him no more... "I cannot love a monster, no matter what we felt for each other before tonight. The wedding is off, Dis."_

_Feeling his brother's keening sobs as the non-pony tore through an entire mob of ponies who wanted to blame him for what happened. Celestia begging him to stop his brother... her lover, to stop him, to save them; he remembered turning away from her with anger in his voice and telling her it was her fault. "He may have killed them, but the blood lies on your hooves, **'Tia.**"_

_Then the war, watching his brother at heart fight his sisters in flight, watched his family tear itself apart... Refusing to pick a side. Finally deciding on his course of action, and freezing a field with his brother's chaos filling the ice, like they used to do to play tricks on Mother and Father... Seeing everyone die below him, until it was just his family; screaming in grief as his sisters turned his brother to stone, not noticing the way the eldest was so gentle with the statue as she took it away..._

_Seeing his younger sister grieve as best she could and then when she just wanted some respect, she was banished. Sent to the moon, never to return._

_Confronting the last of his family and tearing her soul to pieces, taking sadistic joy in watching her sob and try to kill herself, only to fail._

_Leaving, taking to the skies and never setting foot on the ground for nearly 1000 years. and now he was back at the start of things, where it all fell apart. With a whispered "I love you all **so damn much**." that made him sound like his father when the four siblings stopped a dragon on their own, he stood and said to no one "I am Winter Snow, son of Helios and Selene, brother to Chaos himself, trine and wing mate to Luna and Celestia, princesses of Equestria. This is my day of hope, of justice and of vengeance. I shall freeze the world and regain my family, or join those who have passed beyond me into the void between worlds."_

_And with an enraged scream that sounded like wind whipping past a window on the coldest of nights, he leapt from his cloud and spiraled down onto the town now know as Ponyville, snow and ice and perhaps even death itself following in his wake, spinning like a vortex behind him._

* * *

In Ponyville, there was no immediate change as the aforementioned events occurred. Indeed, it was a normal, even peacefully boring, day. Earth Ponies sold their wares to passerby, as did the odd economically or business minded unicorn or Pegasus.

A little foal named Macintosh followed behind his father, silent and strong as they pulled the cart. Macintosh's father, Appleseed, was getting up there in years, being an old military pony before retiring to his father's farm to care for it and his growing family after he met Macintosh's mother. He had a few years left in him still thanks to the care he took of his body, meticulously exercised and groomed each day.  
"You 'bout right ready fer t'day, son?" Appleseed asked his son.  
"Ee-Yup!" was the reply, short and simple. Sometimes Appleseed worried about how intelligent his son was, but reassured himself that his son's silence was simply because the boy liked to listen more than speak, and felt he could learn more that way. And if he took a little longer to make his decisions than most, well, it was just because his boy treated each choice made as potentially life threatening to everyone around him, due to his rather amazing size and prodigious strength. Appleseed was no small pony, but his son was larger than was rightly natural for a pony to be. _'__Well, his mother had some alicorn down the line_,'the older Earth Pony thought. _'T'ain't no sir-prize_ _he'd'a be a big'un.'_

"Say, pa..."  
"Ee-yup, son?"  
"I noticed ma's been actin' real funny... She hit her head or somethin' while we was workin'?"

Appleseed laughed at his son's youthful naivety and said "Naw, son, that ain't it a'tall. Yer ma... and don't go tellin' her I told you this, mind?"  
"Ee-yup!" Macintosh said, proud that his father trusted him enough to tell him what was obviously a deep, dark, potentially awesome secret about his ma.  
"Now, we was wantin' ta wait a bit, but seein' as yer Granny already knows, might as well tell ya. Yer ma's in a special way, son, 'bout as same the way as she was a'fer you come 'long. Yer ma's gonna be bringin' a lil filly home real soon here, an' she's a gonna be yer lil sister, ya see?"  
"I'mma be a big brother?" Macintosh asked his father, thinking about how his friend down the road, Swipes, had a little sister that he teased somethin' awful but was real violent about protecting from other ponies who teased her.  
"Just so, son. You an' me are gonna have a real pretty filly to look after and mind in a few years, 'cause if she's anythin' like you an yer ma, she's gonna have a lotta suitors come knockin on our door... An' it'll be our job to chase 'em off, ya hear?"  
"Ee-Yup! So, pa..."  
"Ee-yup?"  
"D' this mean, seein' as I'll be her big brother an all, I'll be 'Big' Macintosh now?"

Appleseed laughed out loud, a deep, booming one that tended to shake windows if it was heard inside buildings. "Son, I reckon it would! You an' me are gonna have ter be real big to fend off all the stallions yer lil sister's sure to attract. An' come'a think of it, a few of the mares too..."

The father son duo knocked heads together in a rough display of affection, and thus didn't see the small pegasus flying towards the coming storm that had weather pegasi all over town freaking out a little bit.

She herself was fairly unremarkable, save her crisscrossed eyes and strange, muffin shaped cutie mark. Her eyes held a look of sheer determination that looked ill suited to them, yet also seemed to fit well. As she flew, a change passed over her- ice flew from the surrounding skies and latched onto her, forming an armor of ice that made her larger, made her seem less an innocent filly and more the powerful warrior she was. She remembered the events that led her to this point with a strange mixture of grim satisfaction and joyous elation...

_Derpy cried to herself, all alone in the woods where her friends had left her.  
"Well, maybe not my friends anymore..." she thought, remembering the cruel words they'd thrown at her. With a sniffle, she looked to the sky. Her mama always told her not to fly above the real clouds, to never go where it was never spring in the air, nor summer, nor fall, but always biting winter... But today, she needed to find her favorite season, no matter what the weather now was._

_With another sniffle she took to the air and flew, harder than she'd ever flown before. She went so fast, climbed so high, that everything below her was a blur of green and blue and grey. As she went higher and higher, she felt the wind increase. She knew why her mama didn't want her here now...  
'This place is dangerous... Good.'_

_The small filly flew even higher, feeling the wind whip past her. Snow and ice and wind tore at her skin, nicking her with their touch, but she didn't honestly care. As she officially entered the middle of the Frozen Skies, where not even the bravest of pegasi dared to fly, where not even Princess Celestia cared to go for fear that she would be killed by the winds, Derpy felt a strange satisfaction settle in her gut. 'Stupid Derpy' was crazy, maybe, but she could fly. Nopony else would ever come here, she knew that much, and so no one would here what she yelled next._

_"I am Derpy, craziest pegasi there is! I flew into the most dangerous place a pony could fly, and I have not been killed! I shall carry and treasure this moment with me forever more!"_

_Then, with a cry of rage, joy and pure stress relief rolled into one, she sealed her message to the world, with the wind as her messenger.  
"Oh, bravo." a smooth voice behind her said, sounding like wind and a voice layered together. Derpy felt herself shiver in pleasure, but didn't know why, as she turned to face the largest pony she'd ever seen. He was easily head and shoulders over the Princess, and Derpy saw that she herself would probably need four of herself on each others shoulders to come up to his chest (though in her defense, and his she was a rather small filly for her age.)_

"It's not often someone is crazy enough to fly into my skies, and I must say, you're the youngest to do so thus far... and the only one to stay alive. I'm amazed the wolves let you pass."  
"Wolves?" Derpy asked, confused. Then she picked out the shapes whirling behind this new, gigantic alicorn. They looked like they were shaped from wind itself given form, and they growled at her, not menacingly, but instead, it seemed, to inform her that they were, indeed, real and there.

_"Wind Wolves," the alicorn said, smiling slightly. "They make the howling noise ponies often blame the wind for. Normally they're quite vicious if someone comes up here, but apparently they took the day off."_

_Derpy caught the sarcasm in his voice and the smirk he gave, small though it was, and she giggled._

_"So, I suppose introductions are in order, my little pony, as I can't very well call you 'Crazy', can I?"  
"I'm Derpy, craziest, muffin-i-est pony you'll ever meet!" Derpy proclaimed proudly before breaking in to a fit of giggles. The other pony gave a small grin and said "and I, young Derpy, am Winter Snow, self exiling prince of Equestria and Master of Winter, cold, and the winds."  
"Nice to meet you, Mister Winter!" Derpy told him, ever polite (though she realized that if he really WAS a prince, self exiled or no, his manners were **probably** a bit better than hers), and gave a little bow, which, given that she was flying, was fairly impressive on her part.  
_

_Winter Snow took notice of this but said nothing, though he got a thoughtful look on his face. He turned to his Wolves and elicited a cry like a howl of wind, and they padded off, howling as they went.  
"There! Now you'll be allowed to come up here at any time. A little filly as skilled as you has definitely earned a free pass up to my lands."  
"Thanks!" Derpy said, grinning. With a flourish, she pulled out her last muffin from her bag (muffins **always** desrved a flourish in her mind.) "You want my muffin? It's blueberry, Mister Winter!"  
_

_Winter snow full out grinned, and a saner pony would have probably panicked, as normally when alicorns grinned it meant someone, somewhere, was about to get smited. But Derpy was neither sane nor another pony, and so she didn't know that. Winter snow levitated the muffin and cut it in half, not quite perfectly, and gave the bigger half to Derpy.  
"Only, little Derp, if you'll take half."_

_And thus was a friendship born. Each day, Derpy would leave school and buy a muffin, and then fly to Winter Snow. He would cut it and she would take the larger half, and then Derpy would tell him everything that had happened in her day. The alicorn would listen with a bemused expression on his face, and give advice when asked for, and commentary where appropriate. After a time, he began to speak of Equestria's history as he knew it- of how once, there was an alicorn for everything in nature- except a few important things, like life and death, of course. He told her stories of ancient ponies who were so powerful they made most alicorns look like regular old ponies, and alicorns who fell in love with regular ponies. He taught her everything she could ever want to know._

_And then one day, Derpy didn't show up. Winter Snow scoffed and told himself it was no bother- ponies came and went, and he'd already lost everything else he cared about, so what did he care for one little filly?  
A new day, and still no Derpy. Again, Winter Snow told himself he didn't truly care, so why worry? She was just a little filly, of course, and not his concern.  
The third day came and went without a Derpy in sight. Winter Snow gave in and admitted he cared about her._

_The fourth day came and passed, still Derpy-less, and Winter Snow gave in and went to find her.  
_

_And find her he did, lost and alone, and so much blood leaking from her body, so obviously mauled by a manticore, her wings torn from her now greying flesh. He didn't remember what came next, other than screaming in rage and trying to nudge life into her even though it would be impossible. Black and red overcame his vision as conscious thought faded away._

_He woke up to the feel of a wet pony nose nudging his neck and the brush of feathered wings over his chest, three hours later. He opened his eyes and ended up with a hoof-ful of Derpy, and his mind shut down, and all he could think about was that seeing her dead hurt, and she was back, but he didn't ever want to see that horrible sight again, that he'd rather die, and he decided then that he was going to stop telling the girl nothing but stories, and actually start teaching her to fight, because he'd kill himself and everything else if she left him again like that._

_"Mister Winter, what happened, I was so worried, and all I remember is the manticore and then you weren't there and then you were and you fainted and I was so scared because you got so warm and Mmmph!"  
The Pegasus was cut off by giant icy wings wrapping around her body and Winter Snow's voice telling her was never letting her out of his sight again and if she **ever** tried to leave again she would be in so much trouble, and she knew then, barely into her mare-hood or not, that she was in love with this strange pony that had been her friend for years._

_And Winter Snow gave her an armor, armor that made her almost as strong as him. She could summon storms of wind and ice and cold and snow, and when she told him she'd been in the woods because her former friends had carried a prank too far, she literally had to physically hold him back from wiping out the entire school (though she certainly wanted to as well.)._

_Something changed too, with Winter Snow's wolves. where before they had merely tolerated her, now they obeyed her, and, if Winter Snow's disbelieving statements were to be, well, believed, they actually respected her and would do whatever she told them._

_Though Derpy kept up her life away from Winter Snow, she was never alone, and her armor was always only a thought away. Her mama was always incredibly perceptive, and she told Derpy that eventually she'd want to meet her daughter's special somepony, because "I'm your mama, and if I don't like him I want the chance to threaten to geld him!_

Which leads us to now. Derpy, armor covering her, landed on a cloud and waited. From above, she saw Winter Snow and their (his? Her? Celestia's mane, did it even matter whose army it was anymore?) army land on clouds all around her, save her old friend, who landed on the cloud with her. Bowing with a smirk that years ago would have looked misplaced on her face but now seemed never to leave, Derpy said "I am ready, my prince. Command me, for I am yours."  
"Rise, my loyal general." Winter Snow said imperiously, "Rise and hug me, for I have missed you so, my love."

In the years since they had met, and even more since her revival, Derpy had grown immensely. Though she would never reach Winter's height, she now came up to his shoulders without the armor, and his mid-neck with it. Pulling back the ice visor over her eyes that enabled her to see but caused others to see her eyes as 'normal' (and how she _despised_ that foul word), she rose and nestled her head on her future mate's shoulders in greeting.  
"Are you ready, Winter?" she asked, recognizing the determined yet mournful look on his face.  
"Had I only my army and not you by my side, I would say no. Had I only you, I would say yes, for you are all I need."

Derpy flashed a grin and nudged him with her nose. "And if there was no winter, no ice, no frozen tundra to feel you in when you could not be with me, I would never let you leave my side, army to train or no."

And that was the relationship between the two. If Derpy told Winter Snow to drop his dreams of conquest and justice and take her away, his army would be nothing but a pack of Wind Wolves with training but no alpha, and if Winter Snow said he could never let his vengeance go, she would follow him to the void anyways.

"Then lower your visor and take Ponyville. It's yours, after all, Frozen Wastes."

And Derpy grinned at her lover's name for her and attacked the place that might have been her home if the town had been kinder to her.

* * *

A.N: Ok, good, bad? Review, let me know! It might be a bit confusing, but I wanted to sort of bring you all up to speed.

Questions? Comments? Let me know!


	2. Chapter 2

The warm spring sun shone over Ponyville, gently letting the world know that winter was over. Birds chirped, and the world was at peace.

Until a huge, pulsing cloud began to crawl across the sky, whistling and humming like a portent of death. It brought cold, biting wind with it, tearing across the ground, bowling trees and ponies alike over with its ferocity. Appleseed threw himself and his son to the ground as the wind pulled their cart away from them.  
"Too early for tornadoes, ain' it, pa?" Big Macintosh asked his father, yelling to be heard over the wind.  
"This ain't no ternader boy! 'S somethin' worse, an' I don' like it none! Hie yer hide home and mind yer ma an' granny, I'mma go see what all this is about, iffin' I can!" Appleseed told his son, shoving him in the direction he needed to go.

With a nod, Big Mac was off, slowly but surely, fighting against the wind.

Indeed, for every step he took, the wind seemed to laugh and push him back two. With a feral, angry whinny, Mac put his hooves down and yelled out "I ain' no fool-pony, an' I ain' no weak city-pony neither! Mah Pa tol' me ta get home, and tha's wha' I'mma gonna do!"  
This said, he gave another burst of his prodigious strength, and he _pushed the wind back_. Eyes closed, step slow but steady, Mac made his way home, forcing himself through the door. His Granny and his ma had to help him close the door, and with short, panting breaths, he told them what he could.

His ma looked worried, but his granny seemed... Unsurprised, at most.  
"Ma', I gotter get after Appleseed," Macintosh's mother said, clearly worried for her mate.  
"Not with ya bein' in the family way you don', sugar cakes! You an' Mac stay put, Applebelle! I'll get to goin', if any of us does!

Applebelle looked at her mother in law incredulously, confused as to how she knew there would be a new filly in the family soon.  
"Aww, ya'll can't hide this sorta thing from me, Apple! I'm a ma too, ya know!"

Not that the argument mattered at this point. The door burst open, and Appleseed walked in, covered in snow that began to melt in the heat of the house.  
"Hey, 'Bella, we live in Poneyville, right?" he asked his wife, shaking ice from his fur."I reckon we does, why?"  
"Welp, not no more we don't! We done been took over by a mare made of ice and an army of wolves that ya can't touch but ta see em lest yer a Pegasus. Now we done live in Frostville, an' we ain't gonna get much in the way of summer no more."

Confused looks greeted him, and the old stallion explained further.

"I made my way to town after I sent Mac here on home, an' there she were, plain as day. Called herself 'Frozen Wastes, Mistress of lonely, cold places, wind and snow.' an' then she said she were taking over. Froze an entire contingent of the Weather Force solid when they tried to attack her. Then she froze us all in. 'Bout a mile back from our farm's as far as anyone'll be able to go."

* * *

Derpy grinned beneath her face mask and visor as everyone who had once called themselves her 'friends' shook in fear by her hooves. They'd be shaking from the cold soon.

"Now, what to do with nasty little fillies like you?" she asked them mockingly. "Nasty little bitches who leave a 'friend' alone in the Everfree Forest to die, all of you, deserve everything they get. And I know exactly what I'm going to do..."

With a battle cry of rage, she froze Fancy Shmancy, the filly who was once her best friend, directing the ice to form her into a chandelier.  
"The rest of you get out of my sight. You worthless piles of dung make me sick."

As they ran screaming, Derpy walked at a leisurely pace to where her old bully now lay frozen.  
"I know you can hear me, bitch. Beautifuly poetic, isn't it? You left me to _die_, and I'm leaving you to _live!_"

* * *

Bit shorter than I wanted it to be, but hey, an update's an update, right?


End file.
